US Mint suspends mutilated coin redemption program

The U.S. Mint, Washington, suspended its mutilated coin redemption program this May. The U.S. Mint receives large bundles of coins that have been mutilated or damaged in the recycling process of used cars, vending machines, laundry machines and other sources. The program has been operated by U.S. Mint for many decades.

Several years ago, the U.S. Mint suspended this program while pursuing litigation. Scrap recyclers had to store these recovered unusable coins during that period. The U.S. Mint had previously resumed operation of the mutilated coin redemption program in January 2018 as it released new guidelines and certifications for submissions.

Some of the new guidelines include the establishment of procedures for certifying participants based on submission amounts and frequency, sampling submissions to authenticate material, conducting site visits for certain participants and requiring information about how the submissions came to be bent or partial. The Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries (ISRI), Washington, reports that this was considered a major victory for the recycling industry, which had been stockpiling mutilated coins during the moratorium.

As recycling technology has advanced the ability to accumulate coins in significant quantities has grown quickly, ISRI reports that this is an integral part of many recycling companies’ operations and product lines. According to an ISRI news release, the association is reaching out to the U.S. Mint to determine why the program was suspended. ISRI hopes to see the program resume operations as soon as possible.

“After a three-year moratorium, ISRI worked with the U.S. Mint to get the mutilated coin redemption program reinstated at the end of 2017,” says Robin Wiener, president of ISRI. “It is a major disappointment the Mint has once again suspended the program that is worth millions of dollars to the recycling industry. ISRI, on behalf of its members, is working to identify any issues the Mint may have with the program and will once again offer solutions to get the program reinstated as soon as possible.”

“These coins are worth a lot of money,” Johnson adds. “There is nothing the scrap processor can do, other than redeem them with the Mint. The Mint has operated this program for decades to recoup all the damaged coins from the recycling process.”

i-SIGMA honors three members with awards

The International Secure Information Governance & Management Association (i-SIGMA), Phoenix, announced the winners of its Member of the Year Award and Presidents’ Award during the NAID & PRISM International Conference & Expo in Denver. Eric Haas, formerly of De Pere, Wisconsin-based A.R.M.S. Inc., and Thomas J. Seibert, president and CEO at Florida-based Business Records Management Inc., each received the Member of the Year Award. The recipient of the Presidents’ Award was Tom Adams, president and chief marketing officer for Flourish Press Inc. and founder of Webvitality.

In the tradition of National Association for Information Destruction (NAID), every year the association’s executive committee singles out an individual with the presentation of the Member of the Year Award. “With the merger of NAID and PRISM International being less than a year old, it seemed fitting to honor two member representatives this year,” says Angie Singer Keating, CEO of Tyrone, Pennsylvania-based Reclamere Inc. and co-president of i-SIGMA.

Seibert serves on i-SIGMA’s board of directors. Christopher Jones, i-SIGMA co-president, says, “I remember the moment when the merger deal died in a PRISM board meeting. We’d decided we weren’t going to move forward with the discussions. If Tom Seibert hadn’t rounded each board member up and encouraged us all to come back to the table, the merger wouldn’t have happened. I think all i-SIGMA members can see the value of the merger after the success of our joint conference in Denver. If it weren’t for Tom, we wouldn’t have experienced that.”

Haas, the other recipient for the Member of the Year Award, is a former NAID president. i-SIGMA CEO Bob Johnson says, “Eric’s determination, research and work during the merger helped to see it through for NAID. It makes sense that the executive committee found it befitting to name him for this award.”

Unlike Member of the Year, the Presidents’ Award is not given out annually; it’s given only occasionally to acknowledge those who have given a sustained, lasting contribution to the secure information destruction industry. According to an i-SIGMA news release, this award has only been bestowed 14 times in NAID’s 25-year history. This year, Jones and Singer Keating thought Adams of Flourish Press Inc. and Webvitality was deserving, given his service to NAID, Professional Records and Information Services Management International (PRISM International) and i-SIGMA.

“Honoring Tom Adams was just something that we knew we needed to do for his extraordinary work in leading our merger to successful completion,” i-SIGMA states in a press release. “He was probably the only person with such deep knowledge of both associations, that also had the professional experience and emotional intelligence to make this happen. We board members can sometimes have big egos and all of us deeply loved our professional associations. Channeling those egos and passions toward our new, combined association required patience, tact and tenacity. Tom was our beacon and our shepherd. Without him, I truly don’t know if the merger would have happened.”

Momentum Recycling partners with End of Waste Foundation

Costa Mesa, California-based End of Waste Foundation Inc. (EOW) has announced its first partnership with Salt Lake City-based Momentum Recycling. The foundation says Momentum is implementing EOW’s blockchain-technology-based software to track glass from “bin to brand.”

EOW’s "blockchain traceability software" can track the movement of glass from hauler to material recovery facility (MRF), glass processor and manufacturer to “ensure quantities are recycled” and “provide data to increase recycling rates," EOW says. Once the loop is closed, a glass certificate is issued, which verifies the amount recycled, the chain of activity and carbon and greenhouse gas offsets.

Through the program, consumers and companies purchase glass certificates to help increase recycling rates, EOW says. Contributions are redistributed to MRFs and processors to cover negative costs, as well as to invest in technology and workforce.

“We look forward to working with the End of Waste Foundation and appreciate the innovation they are bringing to the system,” Momentum Recycling President and CEO John Lair says. “We are great supporters of their vision of a new distributed shared responsibility, where contributions provide funds to cover negative costs and increase our recycling rates with investments in new technology.”

Momentum recycles glass from communities in Utah and Colorado, including Boulder and Denver. Momentum’s initiatives have increased glass recycling in Colorado from 6 percent to 23 percent, but the company has a goal to boost glass recycling rates to 50 percent and move communities toward a more circular economy. Lair says EOW’s software provides “definitive proof” that glass is being recycled back into bottles through a closed loop system.

“What’s more, the End of Waste Foundation program helps reduce the cost of recycling glass, allowing more to be recycled,” Lair adds. “Our goal is to increase glass recycling rates in Utah and Colorado without container deposit laws to at least 50 percent and the End of Waste Foundation program will be a big boost to those efforts.”

About 67 percent of glass is sent to landfills, according to EOW. Implementing the software “provides transparency” and connects glass manufacturers, consumers and waste management companies to “validate quantities recycled, confirm the activity of each partner and close the glass life cycle.”

“We are extremely happy to have Momentum Recycling on board,” EOW Founder Ionut Georgescu says. “This shows that industry players appreciate the need for trust and transparency in the system and the new model of distributed and shared responsibility that End of Waste Foundation is proposing.”

Georgescu adds, “We’ll be announcing new partnerships soon and we look forward to collaborating with more early adopters in the recycling industry and waste management to increase recycling rates across the U.S.”

WestRock acquires UBS Printing Group

WestRock Company, Atlanta, announced it acquired UBS Printing Group Inc., Corona, California. According to a news release from WestRock, the acquisition expands the company’s capabilities to support the beauty and personal care, nutraceutical and media industries. The acquisition also extends the company’s geographical footprint on the West Coast and will become a part of WestRock’s Multi Packaging Solutions business.

UBS is a specialty printing and packaging company that manufactures high impact cartons, as well as related literature products. The acquisition of UBS fits with the company’s strategy to expand its capabilities and footprint to reflect customer needs.

“UBS is a proven supplier of innovative, decorative, high-impact packaging and has a strong track record of investing in a range of print technologies,” says Marc Shore, president of WestRock’s Multi Packaging Solutions business. “With the addition of this business, we will be better able to serve our customers on the West Coast and further increase our offering of high-end, high-impact decorative products. We are delighted to welcome the UBS team into WestRock’s Multi Packaging Solutions family.”

“Tapping into the innovation of the startup community will help to drive the entire chemistry industry forward,” says Marcelo Lu, president of BASF Canada. “Startups are future-focused and will help to solve some of societies’ biggest challenges. BASF shares that commitment and supports members of Canada’s innovation community like Pyrowave.”

A variety of digital and innovation-focused startups were considered, with the top four companies tasked with pitching business solutions for evaluation by an industry-focused judging panel live at the conference. The evaluation criteria included strategic fit to chemical-related markets, innovation, business plan, global scalability and presentation. In addition to receiving $20,000, Pyrowave will meet with CIAC member companies to evaluate a potential future partnership.

“We are proud to see support from the industry for leading technologies and a strong commitment to make plastics more circular,” says Jocelyn Doucet, CEO of Pyrowave.

Pyrowave’s patented technology helps convert locally mixed plastics, including polystyrene, into products to be used by the chemical industry to manufacture new plastics.